To be witness to a collaboration of photography and writing felt somewhat odd to me, as these two forms of expression usually stand alone and accomplish different goals of the photographer or writer, which is seen through Now Let Us Now Praise Famous Men. Agee points out these differences in the introduction in the beginning of the text, in which he describes “honest journalism” (Agee, 7), and the ways in which writing and photography can depict a true version of what actually occurred. 

Agee strikes up a fairly negative tone throughout this introduction as he discusses the limitations of writing (specifically his own) and the lack of respect for the subjects of these photos. He writes that the camera is “the central instrument of our time; and is why in turn I feel such rage at its misuse: which has spread so nearly universal a corruption of sight that I know of less than a dozen alive whose eyes I can trust so much as my own” (Agee, 11). It is through this “corruption of sight” as Agee describes it, that photography, and writing about this photography, presents a depiction rooted in untruth. 

Personally, I took Agee’s claims with a grain of salt, as I believe writing and photography can reveal the truth in some capacity. I believe that these two things together, though, complicate the truth more than they would if they stood alone due to the personal bias of the writer and photographer. To elaborate, photography, especially without captions, presents an objective image that can be interpreted in many different ways by the viewer, while when writing about a photograph, the writer’s perspective is taken to be fact. However, the angle the photo was taken, the subjects chosen or not chosen, as well as the editing of the photograph in photography, as well as the writer’s subjective reaction to the photo can present a reality that is not the truth.